Forest Temple

Monkey Shines

In the first room here, kill the spiders on the vines to your left with the slingshot, then climb up and grab the Yellow Rupee from the chest. You’re going to probably hit your current maximum rupee limit by the time you leave the dungeon, but every little bit helps. Also note that you can roll into the small totem poles in this area to knock the items atop to the ground; this will come in handy in a couple of instances during the dungeon run-through.

After killing off the enemies here, swipe away at the monkey cage until you free the simian caught within. Prepare to enter hell. Apparently the designers couldn’t be content with simply giving you one of the most annoying helper characters in Zelda history (right behind Tinkle); they also had to make a dungeon that forces you to hear monkeys constantly chittering as you attempt to play through it. Oh, man, if we could only explain how aggravating this is. Feel free to mute your TV while you have monkey companions, because it gets to be pretty aggravating.

Follow our ghetto map to know what rooms we’re talking about in this walkthrough.

Anyway, head into the next room to the north, Room 2 if you’re checking our low-rent map. This is a hub room, with three exits, to the north, west, and east. You can find a secret chest here by staying on the ground and checking out the northeastern corner of the room. There are small creatures that pop up out of the ground here and attempt to leap at you; if you block their attack with your shield, they’ll fall back over onto their backs and eventually explode. You can pick them up before they do so, though; grab one of these guys and throw them at the large rock wall on the northern side of the room, near their hole, and you’ll reveal a chest with 20 rupees.

If you head on up to the platform in the center of the room, you’ll face off against a large spider. These guys can defend against most of your attacks, but if you simply hold the Z button down and wait for them to rear up and prepare to strike, you can unleash a flurry of blows and defeat them. Light the four pyres here to raise a wooden walkway, then head across and open the chest here to find the Dungeon Map. (Note that you can’t reach the chest suspended above the platform just yet.) Head through the door to the north to reach Room 3, but you’ll be stopped when the chimpanzee across the way slices the cords on the bridge with his mighty boomerang. Guess what you’ll be stealing from him later on?

Retrieving The First Monkey

Your goal now is to track down and free enough monkeys to cross the bridge via the rope that hangs alone the two posts connecting where it uses to lie. You have one now, but you’ll need a total of four to make the crossing. Head back to Room 2, then let the monkey suspend itself from the rope leading to the west. Leap over to it and press A at the right time to jump across to the platform leading to Room 4.

As soon as you enter Room 4, take a right and block the explospider there with your shield. It’ll bounce backwards, in front of the rock wall nearby; when it blows up, you can smash the jugs inside to reveal Ooccoo, a creature that will let you warp out of dungeons. She won’t be very useful in here, but she’ll be handy in future dungeons. The monkey will lead you to a locked door in this room, but you don’t have a key! You have to leave the monkey behind (thank god), and head north to Room 5, where you’ll find a Small Key. With that in hand, return to Room 4 and unlock the room the monkey points you toward. (Note that there’s a chest with some Rupees in it hidden in this room; drop into the water and search the southwestern corner of the room to find it.)

In Room 6, drop down to the floor and roll into the central pillar a few times to free the monkey there from its cage. There’s another chest here, hidden away under the wooden walkway. When the monkey’s free, you’ll be able to swing along the ropes back to Room 4.

More Monkey Madness

Remember kids, smoking kills.

Head back to Room 2 and from there, proceed east into Room 7. There are two monkeys in the rooms to the south and east of this room, but to reach them, you’ll have to find some way to destroy the large plants that are blocking your path. Begin by heading up the stairs near you until you find another explospider. Block it with your shield, then run along the walkway to your north until you’re directly above the first plant; Z-target it and toss the spider with A to throw it into the plant’s jaws, which will destroy it. Return to the explospider, block another one, then run and jump across the gap you just freed up before throwing the spider towards the rock on top of the nearby platform; that’ll blow up, revealing the path to Room 8.

In Room 8, drop down and roll into both of the totem poles near the entrance; one of them will drop a chest containing a Small Key. Cross the walkway in the center of this area, being careful to avoid the worms that dwell underneath some of the tiles, and light the two unlit lamps to raise the stairs leading to the monkey’s cage. (Yes, there’s a chest underneath the stairs, but you can’t get it yet. You can climb the vines on the north side of the room to find one on the platofrm there.) Unlock the monkey and deliver it back to Room 2.

Monkey Four

The entrance to Room 9 is to the south of Room 7; it should be easy to find.

Room 9 features another man-eating plant. This one, however, combines the head of a man-eater with the body of one of the explosive-loving plants from Room 7. It’s not difficult to kill; just get in range of its attack, hold Z to block and target it, wait for it to strike, then counterattack with your sword to kill it. When the head is dead, Fred, grab an explospider and chuck it into the body to reveal the Small Key. Free the monkey and return to Room 2. With all four monkeys in your retinue, you’ll finally be able to pass north through Room 3 to Room 10, where’ll fight for the Gale Boomerang.